Ah, yes, so you can torture my ink formula out of me.
I said nothing as Sebastian carried me back to Stranje House. I decided to play dumb, pretend delirium. It wouldn’t be hard. The searing cold and throbbing pain made it difficult to think, let alone speak. But as he mounted the steep path up the cliffs, the climb jostled my head, and I moaned involuntarily.
He lengthened his stride once we got to level ground and I settled into his arms. If only he would’ve kept silent. “Wake up, Miss Ruffles.”
Ruffles. Ohhh, the evil wretch.
He shifted me against his chest. “Come on, you little termagant, I know you’re in there. Say something clever. Or ridiculous. Anything. Perhaps you might tell me why a young lady would dabble with invisible ink formulas?”
Dabble? I almost erred and said it aloud. Dabble, indeed! My experiments constituted a great deal more than mere dabbling. How dare he? Furious, I clenched my jaw. The effort cost me. A whimper escaped.
“Miss Fitzwilliam?” He stopped walking. Sunlight filtered across my eyelids. I felt him staring at me. The rascal bent close and blew a lock of hair away from my face. “Georgiana?”
The audacity of the man—addressing me by my Christian name. I kept mum. I even managed not to shiver when he brushed the side of his finger all tickle-y and gentle against my cheek.
“Damn it,” he whispered. “Wake up.” He took off at an even faster pace than before. “You’re no good to me dead.”
No good to him dead.
How very moving. The milk of human kindness must’ve soured completely before he’d had his sip. Never mind that the man smelled of fresh linen and sunshine, he truly was a despicable wretch. The bruising pace he set nearly made me shriek with pain, but I bit my lip, refusing to give him the satisfaction of knowing I’d awakened. I’d rather pretend to be in a coma for the rest of my life.
Sebastian pushed past the grim butler of Stranje House. “Where’s your mistress?” He whisked me into the foyer. My feet brushed against a flower arrangement on the entry table. “Speak up, man, where’s Miss Stranje?”
“The ballroom, my lord. But you can’t—my lord, wait!”
We were nearly up the stairs by then. The old fellow hurried after us, sputtering like an overheated teakettle. Sebastian kicked open the ballroom doors and strode in.
I peeked cautiously through my eyelashes, and nearly shrieked in horror. Tess, Jane, Sera, and Maya, all of them were bound with ropes to straight-backed chairs, cloth gags tied across their mouths. At the center of this ghastly semicircle stood Madame Cho, steadily thumping her stick, and consulting a timepiece. She must be punishing them because I’d escaped. I moaned.
Miss Stranje took one look at us and snapped her pocket watch shut. “Good Heavens.”
Sebastian headed straight for her, carrying me like a dripping rag across the ballroom. “I believe this belongs to you,” he said flatly.
This? He’d relegated me to a this?
Her heels clicked briskly against the wood floor as she hurried to us. “I’ve got men out searching the roads and inns for her. We’d assumed she’d run home. Why is she wet? What happened?”
“We found our boat run aground, nothing but splinters, and her sprawled out in the rocks with a head wound. Captain Grey has gone for the sawbones.”
But Miss Sadistic Stranje was already plowing none-too-gently through my matted blood-soaked hair, found my injury and was ascertaining the exact dimensions and tenderness. It felt the size of a small thumping rabbit to me, but she declared it, “A sizeable goose egg. Has she explained herself?”
“No.” Lord Wyatt shifted me higher in his arms. “Aside from a moan here and there, she’s been unconscious.”
“Hmm.” The Queen of Cruelty peeled back one of my eyelids and arched her brow. “Oh, you’re awake. How very good of you to join us, Miss Fitzwilliam.”
No use trying to dupe her. I gave up my pretense and glanced past her, at my fellow students, bound and gagged. “What are you doing to them? It’s not their fault. They had nothing to do with my running away.” I sounded like a bleating baby goat, and so forced some strength into my voice. “You cannot mistreat them this way. I shall see you hang for it.” I attempted to shout that last bit, only to shrink back, wincing with pain. In a less boisterous manner, I warned, “I saw that girl’s bones.” At her blank stare, I added, “The dead girl in the pink gown.”
“Bones? Pink gown? What dead girl?” Miss Stranje laid her hand against my forehead. “What are you going on about?”
I thought I saw Tess and Jane exchange a flickering worried glance. But my head hurt so badly, any minute I expected everything to go black. Next it would be my bones rotting in the cave, wearing nothing but this muddy night rail. I closed my eyes.
Miss Stranje heaved a sigh. “She must be delirious.”
“I’m not.” I forced my eyes open to squint at her. My arm flopped out and I pointed at the girls squirming in their ropes to get free. “How can you be so cruel?”
A muffled sound came from Jane.
“Girls!” Miss Stranje clapped her hands. “You’re running out of time.”
“No. Please. Don’t hurt them.” I gestured weakly, my energy flagging. “You can’t.”
She clucked her tongue at me, and spoke to Sebastian in somber undertones. “She must have a fever. Would you be so good as to carry her up to the dormitorium?” With those clicking heels of hers echoing in my head, Miss Stranje tromped ahead of us to the door. “Madame Cho, I leave you to handle the situation here.”
Situation? She meant the girls. But they didn’t deserve Madam Cho’s stick. “Don’t beat them.” My plea fell on deaf ears.
“Greaves, warm some blankets, and send up broth.”
We climbed the stairs, me silent, Sebastian grim-faced. At least, he had the decency not to say any more rude things to me. By now, I expected his arms must be sorely aching, having carried me all the way from the beach. I gave him credit for not complaining. With each step, pinpricks of light flashed at the edge of my vision. I bit hard on my bottom lip to keep from whimpering. Before we reached the dormitorium, the flashes dissolved into a blind stupor. I don’t recall Sebastian leaving. I do vaguely remember someone tugging at my hair with a cloth and a comb, and a stern-faced man listening to my chest with a cone. One of the girls, Jane I think, spooned broth into my mouth. After that, there was only sleep, dark and seemingly endless sleep.
Not restful.
A fitful, meandering, miasma—over and over I relived the previous night, running in dark passages, drowning in waves, crashing on rocks, and wolves standing over me. Finally I dreamed of a huge black stallion with flames snorting from his nostrils. A mysterious stranger rode the ferocious beast. Lest the horse trample me, I ran as fast as I could, but never seemed to escape. When I turned to see him, the rider bore down even harder, laughing at my terror. Flames illuminated his face and I saw that it was that wicked devil Sebastian.
Thrashing at the covers and gasping for dear life, I opened my eyes. “Agh.” Morning poured in as someone threw back the curtains.
“About time you woke up, slugabed.”
I blinked. Tess stood silhouetted in the too-bright window. A small kitten licked my cheek, the tiny tongue tickled as she washed away the sweat of my night terrors. I squinted, grateful for the affection, relieved to have escaped wolves and a fire-breathing stallion. A wee pink nose sniffed at me, white whiskers waved merrily, and tiny red eyes—
I screamed.
It’s true. I admit it. I squawked like a Sunday chicken and shook madly at the covers, sending the vile creature skidding across the floor.
“Stop!” Tess scooped up the rat and cuddled him in the crook of her arm. “He meant you no harm.”
Had I not been half out of my mind at the time, I would’ve sworn that rat squeaked something in response to Tess’s ridiculous speech.
“Did that … that thing,” I said, and pointed, still clutching the covers. “That vermin
spend the night on my bed?” I wiped my cheek. “I thought it was a kitten.”
“I daresay, Punch is as good as any kitten and twice as smart. He sensed you might be lonely. Fine way to repay his kindness.”
The other girls were up and dressed, staring at me. I remembered the gentle touch of Punch’s tongue on my cheek and felt a little ashamed. There had been some comfort in it, even if it was from a rat.
“Are you well enough to get up?” Jane sat down on the edge of the bed.
My head hurt, but it didn’t throb like it had yesterday. “Yes, I think so. How long have I been sleeping?”
“Since yesterday.” Sera tickled the rodent as it tumbled and twisted in Tess’s arms. “The doctor said to let you rest, that you’d be right as rain in the morning. Although, what is right about rain, I’ll never know.”
“And you? What did they do to you?” I asked, looking closely for new bruises. “Did Madame Cho beat you?”
Exchanging furtive glances with one another, they didn’t answer.
“You can tell me. I’ve found a way out. We can escape. There’s a cave—”
Jane patted my hand. “We know all about the cave, Georgie. It’s all right if I call you that, isn’t it?”
It was odd that she would ask permission now, after having freely used my given name in the attic. I nodded.
She straightened the edge of the quilt, not looking at me squarely. “Well then, Georgie, we all think it was awfully good of you to stand up for us the way you did.”
Sera murmured agreement, and Maya said, “Most kind.”
Tess shrugged. “Yes, fine. It was all plumy and sweet of you. But now it’s almost time for breakfast. Do you plan to come with us or shall we send up more broth?”
My stomach grumbled at the notion.
“I believe we have our answer.” Maya’s cheery voice rippled through us like a wind chime, lifting the mood. She opened my trunk and pulled out a sprigged muslin morning gown trimmed with mourning lavender and black. Although I looked ghastly in it, it would have to do. “Perhaps you would like to wear this?” She sounded uncertain.
Sera grimaced at the ugly gown, but grabbed my hand. “First, I believe you might benefit from a quick rinse in the Feetham machine.”
To my astonishment, Miss Stranje’s establishment boasted of an indoor privy. Not only that, the room contained a Cumming’s sliding valve water closet. I had begged my parents to install one of these brilliant new mechanisms at our estate. My venerable parents warned me to stop filling my head with nonsensical ideas. “Chamber pots,” they said. “Have served the aristocracy of England for centuries. It gives the servants something to do during the day.”
Another contraption stood in the privy. The Feetham machine was nothing short of a miracle.
“Climb in.” Sera ordered.
Mouth still agape, I obediently stepped over the edge of a copper tub into the center of a four-legged contraption of pipes supporting a cistern overhead.
“Clothes.” Sera pointed to a stool on which I might place my night rail. Meanwhile she took hold of a hand pump and began working it vigorously. “Pull the chain, but I must warn you—”
Too late.
Eager to see it at work I yanked on the handle. “Awk! Cold. Cold.” Cold water drenched my head. I practically leaped out.
She laughed and handed me a sponge and soap. “May as well finish washing up.”
I did so with all haste. A very reviving experience. The warm towel afterward had never felt so good. Unfortunately, my curls frizzled tighter than ever. Corkscrews, my mother called my wild curls. No use trying to smooth them out. Only with excruciating effort and a hot iron could they be tamed. Thank goodness the machine had washed out the blood and sand. I sighed, grabbed a ribbon from my portmanteau, and tied back my tangled mop.
Maya helped me pull the dress over my head, and tie the side tapes. I took the opportunity to ask, “Why were all of you tied in chairs? What did Madame Cho do to you?”
“If you plan on coming with us, stop talking and hurry up.” Tess sniffed impatiently. “You’ve taken too long already. We aren’t allowed to be late.” She deposited Punch with Judy behind the secret panel and latched it. “I, for one, do not intend to miss breakfast.”
I jammed on my kid slippers and followed Tess and the others downstairs, wondering what was in store for me. Considering my quite literal fall from grace, what would Miss Stranje do to me? I had no desire to spend the day locked inside a metal sarcophagus lined with sharp nails.
Six
MY STUDIES
Outside the breakfast room, I stopped, smoothed back my hair, straightened my spine, leveled my chin, and glided into the sunny yellow room with as much dignity as Anne Boleyn on her way to the chopping block.
“Good morning, Miss Fitzwilliam.” Miss Stranje’s lips twisted in a mocking smile. “Nice of you to join us via the customary route. I’d rather expected you to pop in through one of the secret passages. Heaven knows, there’s bound to be at least one that leads to this room. What say you, Tess? By my reckoning, you’ve explored most of our hidden tunnels.”
Tess stopped scooping eggs onto her plate and glanced guiltily toward a bank of cupboards on the south wall, giving away the answer.
“Ah, yes, through the cupboard. I’d forgotten.” Miss Stranje nodded and pointed to the trays of food on the sideboard. “Do help yourself to kippers and eggs, Georgiana. We’ve much to discuss this morning.”
My stomach growled enthusiastically at her suggestion, thus thwarting my desire to remain dignified. I hurriedly filled a plate with several slices of hothouse oranges, three sausages, a serving of curried eggs, and a whortleberry scone dripping with butter and honey.
The tantalizing smells nearly drove me to madness. It had been a full day since my last real meal. Forgetting my manners altogether, I dove into breakfast with the enthusiasm of a stable lad. Only after several mouthfuls did I regain sanity. They were all looking at me. I rested my fork properly and dabbed at the berry juice and butter on my lips. “Lovely scones. Quite good.”
“I shall convey your praise to Cook,” Miss Stranje said coolly, and turned her attention to the other girls. “You may all attend your various pursuits this morning. Except you, Jane. The steward would like a word with you, something about which fields ought to remain fallow.” She waved her hand airily, dismissing the details.
Jane simply nodded, as if fallow fields were a perfectly normal topic of conversation for young ladies.
Miss Stranje spread jam on a slice of toast and leveled a scolding gaze at Tess. “Miss Aubreyson, It has come to my attention that you have not been as circumspect during your morning exercise as one might hope. Have you forgotten the terms of our agreement? You are not to be observed.”
Tess dropped her spoon. It clattered to her plate. “How did you find out? He told you?”
“Lord Ravencross? Heavens no.”
“Then how?” Tess collected her spoon and stared at her food as if the answer must be hidden in her curried eggs.
We all leaned forward like eavesdropping Nellies awaiting Miss Stranje’s reply. She took a bite of toast before answering. “You nearly got yourself trampled to death. Did you actually think that fact would escape my notice?” She gazed pointedly at each of us. “As mistress of Stranje House, it is my duty to be aware of all that passes here. All.”
It struck me that Miss Stranje moved about this house with more skill than even Tess. Given the knowing slant of her eyes, I doubted even the secret room above our bedchamber was a secret from her.
The shrewd hawk-like expression evaporated from her features. “I trust you will be more discreet in the future?”
With a terse nod, Tess stabbed a sausage.
Our headmistress read from a note in her hand. “Maya, your music instructor begs leave to arrive a half hour late.”
She set the note on a silver tray bearing several other missives. She sorted through the pile and abruptly snatched one fr
om the bottom of the stack. She broke the seal, quickly unfolded the letter, and read intently. The contents seemed to unsettle her. She said nothing but refolded the paper into a tight square and tucked it in her pocket.
Selecting another card from the pile, she tapped her finger against the gilt edge. “Enjoy your day today, ladies. For tomorrow, it looks as though we must entertain guests. Our neighbor, the delightful Lady Pinswary, intends to pay us a visit.”
Sera dragged a piece of potato around her plate. Maya sighed mournfully. I judged by the tight press of our headmistress’s lips and everyone else’s sagging countenances that Lady Pinswary was not actually delightful.
“Here’s another treat for you, a visit from friends your own age. She will be accompanied by her daughter, Miss Pinswary, and her niece, Lady Daneska.”
Sera winced.
Maya heaved an even deeper sigh.
Jane pushed back her chair, and brushed against Tess as she rose. I would’ve sworn she whispered into Tess’s ear on her way to the sideboard where she scooped another kipper onto her plate.
“I saw that, Jane.” Miss Stranje frowned and tossed the card onto the tray. “Really, my dear.” She sniffed. “A little subtlety would not go amiss.”
Jane’s shoulders straightened and she spun around. “My apologies. It was clumsily done. I shall endeavor to improve.”
Tess set down her cup with a jarring clunk. “Jane has a point. She wonders why you’re allowing them in the house? Frankly, so do I. Especially that conniving little traitor. Why don’t you tell Lady Pinswary and her devious niece that we are not at home? Countess or not, you know Daneska is trouble.”
The force of Tess’s outburst shocked me. I expected Miss Stranje to fly into a stern rebuke, or Madame Cho to thrash Tess with her stick. Instead, everyone in the room just sat there looking glum. Everyone except our headmistress.
“I can think of three very good reasons why that tactic would be a mistake.” Miss Stranje cracked the shell of her boiled egg with a swift whack of the spoon. “Seraphina, would you care to speculate as to my reasons?”
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